Without exception, every student dreams of summer holi-days. When you are talking about summer holidays to a student, you can see the little change on his face, and probably you can see a winkle in his eyes. It shows how eager he is to enjoy his own holiday. In our minds, summer holidays are full of dreams and il-lusions. We can do almost every thing we'd pleased to without be-ing restricted.

My summer holidays have always been colourful and full of happiness, but with one exception. It was last summer holiday.

I studied in the key class in our school. The students in our class came from all over Shanxi. They all did very well in study. To my regret, I didn't take studies in my senior class seriously. I played basketball for a long time. And of course, I fell behind oth-ers unconsciously. When I noticed that, it was too late. My class-mates had won many awards in all kinds of nation-wide competi-tions, but I got nothing, even made no progress in my basketball skills. I was shocked. Suddenly I realized that I had wasted too much time of my own. And I knew the only way I could go was to devote all my hours of my summer holidays to studying in or-der to make up all the time I had lost. It was really difficult for me to make such a decision. It needed great courage to give up various activities in summer.

So my hard work began. My aim was to win the nation-wide chemistry competition. As a result I devoted all my hours to chemistry.

I got up early in the morning, and kept working all day long till deep at night. There was only one thought in my mind, that was: "I'll win." No one knew how many times I was on the point of giving up. No one knew how many times I was at my utmost. But every time, my mother, my father, my intimate friends and my dear teacher encouraged me. It was really hard to go on work-ing in such a condition: the temperature was usually up to 40 °C , and there was no air-conditioner in the room, and I had to use a small fan. So I sweated all day long.

What encouraged me most was the words that Madame Curie told us: "Life is not easy for any of us. We must work, and above all we must believe in ourselves. We must believe that each one of us is able to do some thing well. And that we must work until we succeed. "

So what happened to me? I was thinner, but won the first prize of the chemistry competition. Many people said I was lucky to win the award. But they didn't know what's behind my luck.

Thanks to my summer holiday. Though I didn't enjoy my-self, though it was the most difficult time to me, what I have learned is very important. That is: "how to overcome myself. "

指导教师：窦光宇